Shadow of the Moon
by captainisqueen
Summary: These are humans, humans who attack and kill and destroy. She can't imagine how something that looks so kind could be so evil. Raised by Wolves!Cress AU
1. Chapter 1

Crescent's world is one of edges and sharp teeth and claws that scratch out of love. Her world is one of gestures and silence and the sounds of the forest, not words and shouts and music. It's filled with warm fur and soft breath that tickles her ears. She doesn't remember how she got here, just faded memories of boats that crash against rocks and tears that drip down onto her nose. All she knows is that she's here to stay.

It's a sticky summer day when her life changes.

She is traveling to the watering hole with the wolves, to sip from the icy depths and bathe in the cool water that chilled her to the bone. She slides into the frigid water and it feels heavenly on her burning skin. Her pack mother comes in and lets Crescent climb on her back and carries her around the pond, over to the waterfall that she loves.

Everything is calm until they arrive.

They're injured and loud and she wants to cover her ears, they hurt from the unexpected noise. Her pack members are wary and she wants to be wary too, but one of the intruders is tall and he's _beautiful_ , with damp brown hair that sticks to his forehead and crystalline blue eyes, the color of the pond at high noon. He looks delicious, but she resists the urge to leap at him and lick his face.

The alpha of her pack growls quietly, and she is struck by his comment. _These are humans, humans who attack and kill and destroy._ She can't imagine how something that looks so kind could be so evil. He reaches for her and one of the wolves jumps at him and latches on to his leg. She screams.

She runs forward and pulls the canine off the human's leg, all the while sobbing. How could anyone hurt these kind people who just want to be safe? The wolf who attacked is confounded by her statement.

 _They're murderers, Crescent,_ he croaks. She doesn't care.

They banish her from the pack that very night.


	2. Chapter 2

She runs.

It's the logical thing to do. It's also one of her worse skills. She'd never been able to keep up with the real wolves, she was an outsider to them. She doesn't know how she ended up with them, she was too young to know the full story, but she remembers bright blue eyes that match her own and muffled sobs and fat tears that rolled down cheeks. She remembers hushed, haunting lullabies, sung by golden, honeyed voices.

 _Sweet crescent moon_  
 _Up in the sky_  
 _You sing your song so sweetly_  
 _As sunshine passes by_

It's been too long since she's heard real music, not just the songs of the birds, the crickets, the howls of the wolves.

She stumbles through the low hanging branches and the scrubby bushes that scrape her legs. She crosses past weathered rocks and rough oak trees. She cries out in relief when she sees a babbling brook filled with pure clean water.

 _Water._

Crescent collapses on the muddy bank of the small river and inches her way into the water slowly. It's frigid against her bare skin, and she rinses down every part of her body, using leaves she's plucked from the trees to clean herself. She scrubs at the dirt, the grime, the caked-up blood that clings to her. The iron-rich smell has been following her, but now, she's free of it.

And after she's clean and fresh and she no longer feels wighted down from the blood, she cries.

The tears are warm and wet as they drip down her face, and she sobs loudly, knowing that she's prey to any animals that could come across her here. Mountain lions, bobcats, even the very wolves that she'd separated from. She's no longer part of their pack, and they wouldn't hesitate to pounce on her in an instant.

It's this thought of her impending death that gets her up. That and those striking blue eyes she saw at the pond earlier that day. She has no idea how a creature can be so beautiful, especially when the creature is so much like her. She never knew exactly what she was. Long fingers, thin nose, and a small face that's nothing like that of her wolf family. It was a conundrum that she never could solve.

Crescent makes her way deeper into the forest, and her stomach growls as the sky begins to darken bit by bit. Back when she was part of the pack, she could depend on the others for food, but now she's on her own. She quickly finds a sharp stone and stalks a small rabbit that's hopping along the trees, but right as she's about to plunge the makeshift knife into its back, she stops. The rabbit scurries away, and she stops, thinks about how willing she was to just take the rabbit's life like that. It's something her pack members would have done, and she desperately doesn't want to be like her pack, creatures who would've killed a human in the blink of an eye.

She plucks some blackberries off a bush instead, and the fruit she's known all her life to be safe is comforting to her, sour and sweet at the same time.

She treks on, hoping to see someone who will offer her safety, take her in and give her a warm place to stay, some place where she can finally feel safe again.

But no one comes, and she is forced to find shelter. She builds a makeshift home out of large tree limbs, most of them taller than Crescent herself. She leans them against the base of a cliff, and climbs under them, curling into a ball. She falls into a fitful sleep, punctured with nightmares and dreams alike.

The next morning, she is awoken by a loud crash.


End file.
